Immigration Detention Hotels?

7 October 2009 - 10:00am

Homeland Security is looking to change the way the detention of nonviolent undocumented immigrants is handled. Among the ideas for a more appropriate detention system: converting hotels and nursing homes to hold people who are not accused of crimes.

"Several of the initiatives Ms. [Secretary of Homeland Security Janet] Napolitano described, to be formally announced on Tuesday afternoon, are steps on a road outlined in August, when John Morton, the assistant secretary for Immigration and Customs Enforcement, announced an ambitious plan to transform the penal network into a 'truly civil detention system.'"

"A request for proposals to build two model detention centers, one in California, will be issued within a year, said Mr. Morton, the ICE official. On Oct. 30, he said, he will solicit proposals and market research about converted hotels, nursing homes and other residential facilities that could serve as less expensive and less restrictive detention centers."

Source: The New York Times, October 5, 2009
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